Eating Lightbulbs vol 4: Dogtooth

Dogtooth

I remember the day we brought You home, it was a lukewarm day in mid-September. The morning was cool, but the day was still hot. I had marching band that afternoon after school, I came home, and You were just – there. You were there, and that's all I could really say about You at the time. We laid You to rest with the same tears in our eyes as the day we brought You home. This time, however, the hate and malice would turn to sorrow and gratitude. What to do with all my misery, anger, and hate?

I get it if You hate me.

My sister was never the one to be penny-eyed, it didn't matter how it cost – if she wanted it or if she wanted to, she would or she would buy it. In retrospect, it could have been just one bad manic episode forever played out as joke on us to cover up the punchline of losing a member of the family just to force You into being one. But it didn't matter, You were here, and You were here to stay all the same – whether we like it or not.

I couldn't understand how You could love me.

It was a tear of joy against a touch of malice. Pain, against the pleasure of knowing You're no longer in it. I was awash in the dull morning aches, as my knees creaked as my feet hit the floor every morning to feed You, to help You to the bathroom, to play with You – awash in the cool night terrors of longing for You when You were gone. My days bleeding into yesterday, a fake apology will never clean the mess I've made.

Death is a cruel mistress.

She loves me only when I want You to leave, leaving me when I no longer seek solitude and instead, seek comfort in her love. She only yearns for me when I've gotten up and gotten over it – extending to me an olive branch and hiding the gun in her other hand, its fake, like her blood. As I stand lying, reading Your eulogy, I would stop to wonder why You would have loved any of us.

What hurts the most...

There was a shallow hole in which I buried my shallows whole, to which by that hole I swallowed my sorrows wholly. Dear deer in a cage, with soft fur and horns to detail my rage, speak an ode to the Hell I'd raze, and the burden You took with You from page to grave: cancer. Its those holes we dig that are safest place to hide. I remember the holes You dug, longing to be free from the backyard to something more out there. Your hungry eyes hollowed and bottomed out.

What's a song You wanted to die to?

Please, raise a canine, snarl at Death for her rude misgivings. I hope You can walk free without leash... trotting softly on gold sidewalks and silver city streets. What angel should I pray to now, if not You? My sweet dog, You are forever.